Hold Fire

Forces a unit to stop firing momentarily. Good for when you're trying to move units around.

Hold Fire is a basic command that stops a target unit of yours from firing for 5 seconds, but it requires an NCO or Officer in your squad.

This command can be issued multiple times on the same unit to renew the cease-fire timer (it does not stack, though), and there's no limit to how often or how much you use it. Because of how frequently you may need it, learning its hotkey (2-1) is advisable. You cannot issue this order to pinned soldiers or to vehicles.

Hold fire is commonly used if a German is infiltrating your lines, whereupon one could say that it just might be a good idea to tell those bazookas and grenadiers to hold onto their charges—for the love of God!

Fun facts

In the first patches, when a soldier was pinned, you could unpin them by giving them this command.

This command also stops an officer gesticulating or using his binoculars.

When you attempt to use this command on a pinned soldier, you will receive the message: "This soldier is pinned, and obviously not firing his weapon... But thanks for making sure."

This command stops a signaler from successfully making a call. Useful for cancelling.